Chiaroscuro
by TheSaintRyan
Summary: Literally translated from latin, Chiaroscuro means "Light-dark" and refers to the tonal shifts from black to white in art that give things form and volume. Both the light and the dark are necessary to the whole.


Chiaroscuro

It's not that he means to fall in love with Derek Hale. That would just be absurd. No, this is somehow foreign and familiar at once; the crushing loss when they're apart; the way everything seems to come alive when their eyes meet; the static rippling through him when they touch even for a second; the intense pull, every molecule in Stiles straining closer and closer to Derek every second. He doesn't mean to fall in love, but it happens. And maybe that's just who Stiles is, someone who just can't be content, who has to push and push until it breaks. And it always breaks. Or maybe he's just tired of being alone: Maybe he wants someone to laugh with him, not that Derek does a lot of laughing. Maybe he's just worried that if he's alone too long he'll push and push until _he_ breaks.

Maybe after all he's lost he just wants someone there who won't break. Someone who can take it, who can bounce back. After all, his relationship history is just about as empty as could be; nearly a decade of an unrequited love-affair with the most impossible, precocious, insane woman in all of time and space. Awkward tumbles, reeking of teenaged trepidation, desperation, with Scott. Not to mention the aching, crimson _hole_ his mother left. Having to gaze brokenly at what once was a lively and loving woman but who now resembled a mummy so paper-thin and fragile and pallid. Having to do his damnedest to force all thoughts of her to die because how, HOW ELSE could he possibly go on existing without her, how could he possibly justify that she was gone and he'd just been left in this sprawling terminal waste? Maybe, even, he is so sick of his self-imposed imprisonment that he would accept anything- even Derek's aborted emotion and physical intimidation and bad blood and tortured soul- and treasure it?  
So, no, he doesn't intend on falling in love at all; much less with Derek Hale of all people, but he does.  
And if they say that love makes you do crazy things, well, that's an understatement. Crazy is split personalities or having a tenuous grasp on reality or talking to God. What Stiles does; opening his window and shouting out into the night like his voice will carry across miles and miles of silence to awaken the wolf, shouting "Seek me out!" "Wake me up!" "Give me something!" _That_ is love, not insanity. That is stupidity. He hears his dad yell from downstairs, "HAVE YOU LOST YOUR MIND?" and can't bring himself to disagree. For good measure, Stiles whispers "Look at me" and it may be the effect love is having on his nervous system but he thinks, for a second, as he closes the window, that he sees a flash of red eyes in the night.  
It's thoughts of a wolfish smile that sing him to sleep.

The February sun rises with little gusto; does little to assuage the ripping cold. A harsh blanket of snow drowned Beacon Hills overnight. His jeep rumbles all the way through the forest trails that Stiles knows so well. Hale manor rises from the horizon like a burned husk of a sun and brings him more warmth than the sun itself. By the time he's parked and exited the vehicle, Derek stands statuesque on the porch, impassive. Their eyes meet and Stiles suppresses a shudder, visibly restraining his body. He can feel his heart rate rising; he knows that Derek can hear it, though whether that calms or excites him he isn't sure. Derek breathes hotly in the frigid air and Stiles' best efforts fail to hide the shiver that works itself insidious up his spine. Derek barks out "What are you doing here?"  
Stiles doesn't have any clever answer so he shrugs and mutters, "I don't know. Maybe I just missed you, wolfy." Derek forces a laugh before returning his face to one of apathy, or perhaps ambivalence. He approaches slowly, like he's scared, and walks right past Derek and into what once was a home. Derek has him pinned up against a wall in less than a breath and a noise of some sort gets caught in Stiles' throat. He feels like pushing things, so he leans in quick and catches Derek's soft lips with his own. Derek growls and pushes off, halting feet away and staring, surprised. "What the hell-" he begins before Stiles is pushing by him again and walking out the door. Should it hurt that Derek doesn't stop him? Should he care? Stiles has no answers, but when he's spun around and thrown into the door of his jeep, and when Derek's lips crash into Stiles' chapped mouth, he realizes he doesn't need any. Teeth scrape against his lower lip and he keens out quietly, opening his mouth against the hot bear trap that anchors him down. Tongues lash together red and slick and Derek growls deep in his chest. Stiles' thin hands find Derek's back, nails catching fabric and pulling desperately. One of Derek's firm paws graces the pale, blemished canvas of Stiles' cheek and paints it a flushed pink. But then the touches are gone and Stiles shivers again as he feels a cold wind rip the warmth from him. "Get out of here." Derek commands and Stiles obeys without question.  
The ride back to town is ages-long and when Stiles pulls up outside Scott's house he blinks in confusion. Shrugging again he leaps from the vehicle and rushes onto the porch, surging through the unlocked door and bursting into Scott's room. "Wh- what the _hell_ dude. What time is it?" Scott mumbles through a thick wool of sleep and Stiles checks his phone for the third time in as many minutes. "Like seven. Or something. I need to ask you something."  
"_What_?!" "Would you still love me if I like, fucked guys?"  
"What?"  
"I think... I don't know. I think I like guys or something. Well, one guy but still. I mean.. it's really weird and I don't really know what to think. Would you still love me Scottie?"  
Several emotions roulette across Scott's face until he settles for one that says "Yes you idiot was this really important at seven am on a Saturday?" "Thanks Scott," Stiles shouts over his shoulder as he retreats down the stairs and out the door, passing a fairly confused Melissa McCall.

He returns home and his dad stands waiting at the door. "What the hell were you doing last night?" He asks. Stiles tilts his head to the left and thinks for a moment, before replying "Existential crisis" as if that covers it. His dad looks annoyed, but shrugs and mumbles something about teenagers as if he understands exactly. Stiles searches the cupboard and settles for some generic healthy cereal. His stomach gives up on aching, but he is still consumed by hunger. Without purpose he sets out again and when he arrives at the old Hale house for the second time he lets out a bitter and incredulous laugh.

He finds Derek in what could have been a kitchen, doing pushups with a little too much focus. Derek stops and stands in a fluid motion and his eyes, light catching them so they flash more rust than jade, turn to Stiles. "What the fuck was that, Stiles?" He says, with no real interest, and Stiles laughs too loud before turning his yellow eyes to the wolf. "I could ask you the same thing, though I did start it so I guess I shouldn't. I don't know, Derek."

Even inside it's cold, and for a while their steaming breaths are the only movement in the house. Derek canters off and Stiles is in pursuit, until the older man rounds on him and bares his teeth; it takes moments for yellow eyes to pull themselves from the white daggers and back to Derek's. "You know that I can't do this, kid," Derek says roughly and Stiles pauses for a second, before retorting "You of all people should know I'm not a damn kid."

Derek snorts dismissively and glances to the right, avoiding Stiles' eyes that question or plead or beg for an answer. Whatever Derek is attempting to distract himself with; the charcoal-gray wall, the cracks and splinters, the heat that may linger there from Stiles' back less than an hour ago, proves to be unsatisfactory so he returns his gaze to the 17-year-old still standing feet from him. "Did you hear me, last night?" Stiles asks, and Derek's head angles to the left, confused. "Never mind," Stiles starts, but as he turns to leave the wolf's heat is at his back, breaths teasing his neck. Stiles stops dead and forces out a breath he'd kept too long. As he shakes again his eyes settle on a half-burned, empty picture frame on the wall. "Stiles, if you think I don't want this you're stupider than I thought. But..." Derek steps back, and Stiles faces him again. Derek sweeps his arms out, gesturing to the corpse of Hale manor; Stiles _knows_ what follows, he knows the story, knows the origin of Derek's broken countenance. It doesn't make it easier to accept. "Derek." He says, though in that word he expresses guilt and melancholy; desire and hope. It seems to catch Derek off guard as he flinches, his peculiar eyes saying yes and no simultaneously. He seems to fight himself a while, before stepping in and pulling Stiles close. Stiles feels his heart bloom and tastes the saccharine tone of hope blossoming.


End file.
